Gala Open-Air Museum: Life on the Absheron Peninsula
Forty minutes from Baku you can step into an old Absheron courtyard, watch bread being baked and carpets woven, and walk among burial mounds.
The village of Gala on the eastern Absheron Peninsula is one of the oldest settlements around Baku. Archaeologists found traces of life going back some five thousand years, and the reserve holds burial mounds, tombs, old houses, mosques, bathhouses and water cisterns.
What's inside
In 2008 part of the site became an open-air ethnographic museum, with reconstructed flat-roofed Absheron houses, a courtyard with a well, a barn and workshops.
During the visit you see how people:
- wove wool carpets on an upright loom;
- baked bread in a tandoor and made qutab flatbreads;
- stored water and grain in a dry climate.
Why go
Gala is a great contrast to modern Baku — it shows how people lived on the peninsula before the oil boom. The museum is compact; 1–1.5 hours is enough.
Combine it
Gala is close to the Ateshgah fire temple and the burning hill of Yanar Dag, so all three fit into one trip — exactly like our Absheron peninsula tour.
Related tours
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